KFF Health News’ ‘What the Health?’: Digesting Trump’s Big Budget Law

Table of Contents

The Host

Julie Rovner
KFF Health News

@julierovner.bsky.social

Julie Rovner is chief Washington correspondent and host of KFF Health News’ weekly health policy news podcast, “What the Health?” A noted expert on health policy issues, Julie is the author of the critically praised reference book “Health Care Politics and Policy A to Z,” now in its third edition.

As he had wanted, President Donald Trump signed his big budget bill into a big budget law in a White House ceremony on July 4, cementing, among other things, billions of dollars in cuts to health programs such as Medicaid. The new law will also reshape rules for the Affordable Care Act, Medicare, and other health programs.

Meanwhile, the threat of layoffs continues to hang over the heads of employees at the Department of Health and Human Services, and funding for health-related contracts and grants remains stalled.

This week’s panelists are Julie Rovner of KFF Health News, Rachel Cohrs Zhang of Bloomberg News, Rachel Roubein of The Washington Post, and Tami Luhby of CNN.

Panelists

Rachel Cohrs Zhang
Bloomberg News

@rachelcohrs

Rachel Roubein
The Washington Post

@rachel_roubein

Read Rachel’s stories.

Tami Luhby
CNN

@Luhby

Read Tami’s stories.

Among the takeaways from this week’s episode:

As details of Trump’s tax and domestic policy law come into focus, it’s clear that many immigrants in the country legally stand to lose government benefits, especially health coverage. While the GOP described the legislation as targeting “illegal immigrants,” the law as written bars many individuals living here with the government’s permission — including refugees and victims of domestic abuse and trafficking — from signing up for Medicaid, receiving Affordable Care Act marketplace subsidies, and more.
Other aspects of Trump’s priority-laden law received extra attention following its hastened passage. In an unusually political move, the Social Security Administration touted to beneficiaries the law’s cuts to taxes on Social Security benefits — which is neither what the law does nor what a federal agency traditionally does when Congress passes a law.
This week, the Supreme Court issued a decision from its shadow docket supporting the Trump administration’s ability to lay off federal workers using only his executive authority. That opinion is the latest curve on this year’s employment roller coaster for government employees, suggesting many people could soon lose their jobs.
In health agency news, public health groups are suing the Trump administration over the withdrawn recommendations on covid-19 vaccines — as insurers and others in the health industry sort out how to handle a federal shift in immunization recommendations. And HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. canceled a meeting of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force. The abrupt cancellation suggests Kennedy could soon remake the panel, as he did last month with the panel on vaccines.

Also this week, Rovner interviews KFF Health News’ Julie Appleby, who reported the latest KFF Health News’ “Bill of the Month” feature, about some very expensive childhood immunizations. If you have a medical bill that’s exorbitant, baffling, or confusing, send it to us here.

Plus, for “extra credit” the panelists suggest health policy stories they read this week that they think you should read, too:

Julie Rovner: The New England Journal of Medicine’s “The Corporatization of U.S. Health Care — A New Perspective Series,” by Debra Malina, et al.

Rachel Roubein: The Associated Press’ “RFK Jr. Promoted a Food Company He Says Will Make Americans Healthy. Their Meals Are Ultraprocessed,” by Amanda Seitz and JoNel Aleccia.

Rachel Cohrs Zhang: The Wall Street Journal’s “Prosecutors Question Doctors About UnitedHealth’s Medicare Billing Practices,” by Christopher Weaver and Anna Wilde Mathews.

Tami Luhby: The Washington Post’s “A New D.C. Hospital Grapples With Too Many Patients and Too Few Nurses,” by Jenna Portnoy.

Also mentioned in this week’s podcast:

The Washington Post’s “Inside Operation Gold Rush, Largest Health Care Fraud Bust in U.S. History,” by Dan Diamond and Lauren Weber.
KFF Health News’ “World’s Premier Cancer Institute Faces Crippling Cuts and Chaos,” by Rachana Pradhan and Arthur Allen.
Stat’s “Inside the Staff Exodus and Tanking Morale That Threaten Makary’s FDA,” by Lizzy Lawrence.
The New York Times Magazine’s “Inside the Collapse of the F.D.A.,” by Jeneen Interlandi.
CNN’s “Social Security Administration Praises Trump’s Agenda Bill in Widely Sent Out Statement,” by Shania Shelton and Tami Luhby.

Credits

Francis Ying
Audio producer

Emmarie Huetteman
Editor

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KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.